Welcome to Studio City

Frank Sinatra, the Beach Boys, Michael Jackson, the Doors, Fleetwood Mac--it’s no surprise that these artists, all identified to a large extent with Los Angeles, made many of their best-known recordings in studios located in the city.

But what about Elvis Presley, a performer indelibly linked to Memphis, Tenn.? The King recorded many of his biggest hits, including “Jailhouse Rock� and “All Shook Up,� in Los Angeles.

Or the Rolling Stones, the quintessential ambassadors of Swinging London? “Satisfaction� tops the long list of sides they laid down in L.A. Whitney Houston’s biggest hit, “I Will Always Love You,� is entered on the log of a recording facility in Los Angeles rather than in her native New Jersey.

And the beat goes on. In the past couple of years, acts from Chicago (the Smashing Pumpkins), Minnesota (Semisonic), Texas (Lyle Lovett), Buffalo (the Goo Goo Dolls) and Pennsylvania (Live) have continued to make L.A. the destination of choice for rock and pop musicians looking to book some time to cut a hit.

The tradition endures, but many of the historic studios are gone, including Gold Star at Santa Monica and Vine in Hollywood, where producer Phil Spector cut the Ronettes’ “Be My Baby� and his other “Wall of Sound� classics, and Wally Heider on Cahuenga in Hollywood, the haven for such L.A. singer-songwriters as Jackson Browne and Gram Parsons. They’ve been razed and replaced by a strip mall and an office building, respectively.

Still, L.A. boasts more first-class recording facilities than any other city, according to Ellis Sorkin, owner of Studio Referral Service, an agency that matches artists and studios. Along with such other major players as the Record Plant and Conway, the following establishments have seen countless musical legends cross their thresholds to leave their imprint on pop cultural history. Each studio comes with its own folklore--the stories are legion. As you stroll through them, you almost feel transported to those classic sessions.

OCEAN WAY

6050 Sunset Blvd.

When engineers, producers and musicians discuss the merits of studios, the term “vibe� gets tossed around a lot. But what does it mean? For Ocean Way owner Allen Sides, it has to do with balancing relaxed atmosphere with technical proficiency--and, in his case, brown shag carpet.

“[Producer] Rick Rubin, who works here a lot, told me that he wouldn’t work here if I took out the old carpet in the hallway,� says the lanky Sides. “He really appreciates what this place is all about.�

Located in the heart of Hollywood, Ocean Way is one of the busiest studios in the world. But the facility’s appeal isn’t only its state-of-the-art gear and what Sides calls the largest collection of vintage microphones in the world. It’s also a perpetual hit factory. Bonnie Raitt’s breakthrough album, 1989’s “Nick of Time,� was recorded here. So were Houston’s “I Will Always Love You,� the 1992 single that was one of the biggest-selling records ever, and Natalie Cole’s Grammy-winning 1991 album, “Unforgettable With Love.�

Younger artists such as Beck, the Goo Goo Dolls and Semisonic have recorded hits at Ocean Way, as have legends ranging from Bob Dylan and Barbra Streisand to Michael Jackson and the Rolling Stones (“They used a thousand reels of tape the last time they were here,� Sides says).

There’s something both funky and fastidious about Ocean Way. Despite the sophistication of the equipment and the technical crew, you get the feeling that some of the capacious rooms haven’t been upgraded in decades--and that’s how Sides likes it.

Ocean Way’s main building, built in 1900, was once Douglas Fairbanks’ sound stage. In 1959, Chicago record producer Bill Putnam purchased the building and a nearby structure and combined them as United Western Recorders, which quickly became hugely popular with musicians, according to Sides.

“Albums went much quicker then--they would have three sessions a day in each room,� says Sides, who was a studio apprentice in the early ‘70s. “You would have Sinatra in one studio, the Fifth Dimension in another and Richard Burton doing voice-overs in another.�

Sides purchased the studio in 1977, renaming it Ocean Way after his own short-lived but successful facility on Ocean Way just north of Santa Monica. Since then, he’s added two more studio complexes--Record One in Sherman Oaks and Ocean Way Nashville.

Sides concedes that for all the audio wizardry that has been used in the service of making records in his studios, technology has its limits.

“Streisand can record a song in one take, yet they will insist on taking apart every word, phrase, syllable and breath to achieve perfection,� Sides says. “But sometimes a technically enhanced performance isn’t necessarily perfection.�

THE VILLAGE

1616 Butler Ave.

At the height of its popularity from the late ‘60s to the late ‘70s, the Village (then called Village Recorder) was the studio of choice for some of L.A.’s biggest stars. Fleetwood Mac recorded “Rumours�--one of pop music’s all-time cash register champs--in the enormous Studio D, which was built specially for the sessions. Bob Dylan recorded his first No. 1 album, “Planet Waves,� there in 1974, and Steely Dan, among the most exacting studio craftsmen of the ‘70s, recorded the bulk of its catalog in Studio B.

A former Masonic temple discreetly tucked away on a quiet street corner in West L.A., the Village saw its fortunes sag in the late ‘80s, as larger, more sophisticated studios began to lure clients. By 1990, the Village had became largely obsolete, and owner Geordie Hormel was ready to sell it.

Now, the Village finds itself in the midst of a renaissance. Four years after former agent and Greek Theatre booker Jeff Greenberg took over as CEO, the Village has restored some luster to its legend, becoming an in-demand facility once again.

“The Village has such a palpable presence and energy,� Greenberg says. “You can feel it just standing in the rooms. Whenever artists want to know about the studio, instead of sending them pictures of the recording consoles, we send them exterior shots.�

Indeed, the Village does evoke a cozy, hippie crash-pad ambience. The building, once the headquarters of the Beatles’ onetime guru Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, has a rather eccentric floor plan. To get to the back rooms, you wend your way though a labyrinth of narrow hallways and staircases.

Greenberg can regale you with Village tales for hours, starting with the time Dylan wrote “Forever Young� in an office there during the “Planet Waves� sessions.

It was the Village’s colorful history and unorthodox layout that initially attracted Billy Corgan, whose band the Smashing Pumpkins recorded both “Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness� and “Adore� in Studio B.

“The way studio B is set up is really undesirable,� says Robbie Robertson, the former member of the Band who has been using the Village since 1974. “The control room faces a wall, so you can’t see the musicians in the studio, and there’s an elevator for the piano for no reason whatsoever. But that’s why Billy Corgan liked it.

“When I recorded in there, I set up some of my musicians in the bathroom, and we came up with some great stuff. Why it works is a bit of a mystery to everyone. The Village just has a lot of soul.�

CAPITOL

1750 N. Vine St., Hollywood

From the mid-’40s until roughly the mid-’60s, labels owned and operated their own recording studios. The idea was to integrate the creative and business ends of the industry and keep production costs down. For a while, it worked: Columbia, Warner Bros., RCA, Elektra, Decca and Capitol all had their own studios in L.A., each with a distinct sound.

“In the ‘50s and ‘60s, the studios had a sound that was affiliated with their labels,� says producer Jack Joseph Puig, who has worked with contemporary artists such as Semisonic and the Black Crowes. “You signed to a label because you wanted that sound. They would just modify their equipment to make it sound different from everyone else’s.�

But recording equipment became more uniform and labels began to sell off their studios in the ‘70s. In L.A., only two holdovers remain--A&M; and Capitol.

Capitol opened its first studio in 1942 at its old Melrose Avenue location. The current studios, situated on the ground floor of the label’s landmark tower on Vine Street, were built in 1954.

As Capitol gained a reputation as a “singer’s label,� countless stars recorded there, including Bing Crosby, Nat King Cole, Judy Garland, Peggy Lee, Dean Martin and Bobby Darin.

But Capitol’s studios, particularly Studio B, are primarily associated with one man: Sinatra, who worked in the ‘50s with such classic arrangers as Nelson Riddle, Billy May and Gordon Jenkins. Albums such as “Songs for Swinging Lovers� and “Come Fly With Me� were recorded here.

Four decades later, Sinatra helped usher in fiber-optic technology to recording studios, when his 1993 “Duets� album became the first to record simultaneous performances at different locations. Capitol sees historical continuity as one of the studio’s best assets, so while Studio A has undergone a complete overhaul, Sinatra’s Studio B remains pretty much the same as it was four decades ago. From the striated wood paneling to the vintage analog gear, it’s redolent of another time and place.

There are even some physical artifacts from that era--Frank’s favored metal stools are scattered about.

“Frank is the godfather around here,� says studio director Michael Frondelli. “Artists come here because they understand the studio’s history and want to be a part of it.� Barry Manilow chose it to record his upcoming Sinatra tribute album.

“The performance area has not been touched because it sounds so good,� says Frondelli. “The voodoo’s in this place.�

LARRABEE

8811 Santa Monica Blvd., West Hollywood

Whether by design or default, a handful of L.A. studios tends to specialize in a particular genre. While West Hollywood’s Larrabee Sound Studios and its sister facility in North Hollywood are now considered the premier recording spaces for hip-hop and R&B; in L.A., it wasn’t always so. When owner Kevin Mills’ father, Jackie Mills, purchased the studio from songwriter Gerry Goffin (of the Goffin-Carole King team) in 1969, Larrabee was doing what the younger Mills calls “mid-level� work, mostly for TV shows such as “The Brady Bunch.�

Then disco exploded in the mid-’70s and Larrabee seized the moment. “Because of our location, which is near all of the record companies, we were able to attract a lot of clients,� says Kevin Mills. Larrabee practically became the the house studio for labels such as Casablanca, which used the studio to record tracks by the Village People, Donna Summer and Parliament-Funkadelic.

When Larrabee became one of the first studios in L.A. to purchase a Solid State Logic mixing console (which became the industry standard) in 1979, it began to attract A-list R&B; and dance music producers such as Babyface, Shep Pettibone, Teddy Riley and Jellybean Benitez.

A large chunk of Larrabee’s business, however, involves mixing and remixing tracks for R&B; artists. Larrabee was the first studio in L.A. to sell blocks of studio time strictly for mixing tracks--what the industry calls “lockout� time. In fact, Billboard magazine recently declared that Larrabee mixed more No. 1 R&B; records last year than any other studio in the country.

Recent projects have included Brandy and Monica’s “The Boy Is Mine,� Montell Jordan’s “Let’s Ride� and Will Smith’s “Just the Two of Us.� Madonna is also a good client--she booked all four rooms at Larrabee to record her recent album “Ray of Light.�

“Madonna’s a total professional in the studio, but she goes to great lengths to bring a little bit of home around her while she’s recording,� says studio manager Jamie Way. “Every night, the engineers and musicians all sit down to a formal candlelight dinner in the studio and laugh their heads off.�

With its bare wood beams and contemporary furniture, Larrabee has a casually chic vibe, one that Mills is careful to cultivate. “People spend so much time in studios, you want a place that’s comfortable,� he says. “It’s not really like a standard studio that way.�